Tuesday, December 29, 2015

Except that any fashioner or overseer of military
and civilian threat analysis could never swear to anything in a court of law or
during a Congressional committee hearing, because he would invariably perjure
himself. So he would hedge behind a well-rehearsed litany of presuppositions
and assumptions.

Continuing a column on “Our Ignorance” from Stephen
Coughlin’s Catastrophic
Failure: Blindfolding America in the Face of Jihad (pp. 443-484), from Institutionalized
Ignorance of Islam, I will focus here on the rendering of language and
words to meaninglessness by Army writing guides discussed by Stephen Coughlin
in “Our Ignorance.” I thought a Socratic exposition of the subject would better
drive home the point over a straight narrative.

In a fictive, imaginary setting, a
House or Senate committee hearing member, identified here as the Interrogator, in full possession of his
faculty of reason, might challenge the “expert witness” about what he knows and
what he claims he knows – or doesn’t
know. The hearing has been convened to examine the reason why the nation’s “War
on Terror” has not prevented the commission of terrorist acts in the U.S., and
is in general ineffectual.

The
Witness, a captain in a U.S. Army
counter-intelligence unit, has just finished delivering an opening statement
about how his unit conducts threat analyses and contributes to the government’s
ability to fight the “War on Terror.” He reads the conclusion of his statement:

Witness: Our recommendations and
conclusions are then forwarded to the next echelon of threat assessment evaluation
with the best assumptions and presuppositions underscored and emphasized, which
subsume all possible likelihoodsand
scenarios concerning the enemy’s next activity. Our highly combed assumptions
and presuppositions have played no little role in projecting anticipated enemy
activity, and enabled us to counter hypothetical but very significant threats.
Often, facts play a role in the final assessment.

The
Interrogator replies: Assumptions
and presuppositions are not admissible evidence, sir, neither as sworn
testimony nor in depositions. We need to know why our counter- and
anti-terrorism efforts have been salutary failures. You have already
acknowledged that they are failures. Please state facts. Facts constitute
evidence, not suppositions, presuppositions, or assumptions.

Witness: As I know them? As I see them?

Interrogator: No. As they are. You say facts often have a place in a final
assessment. Shouldn’t they always? Shouldn’t they be the center point in any
assessment, forecast, or prediction?

Witness:[Scoffs in reply] Begging your pardon, but we
can’t be sure that they are factual.
We can only assume or suppose that they’re raw, unrefined approximations of
things as they really are, which we, as human beings susceptible to error and
fallibility, can't know. That’s what facts
are. This is especially true…I mean, applicable…concerning human actions and
psychology. We in the services – or in the FBI, and the CIA, or DHS, or the
Pentagon, and so on – are proud to admit that we don’t pretend to know
anything. Anything at all…about this, I mean.

Interrogator: About who or what causes
terrorism? So, you’re saying you can't know the truth, because facts are
finicky, Heraclitean things, you can't depend on them to be true all the time?

Witness: [Blinks
in confusion.] Excuse me, sir?

Interrogator: Heraclitus, a
pre-Socratic philosopher. He claimed that things are never the same from moment
to moment. Like a river. That’s a Heraclitean notion of yours, claiming that
facts only occasionally play a role in your assessments and have little or no
bearing on the truth. You insinuate that truths are chimerical. You have little
use for them.

Witness: Oh….

Interrogator: As for truth, or true, I think a definition is in order
at this point. [Opens a book on his dais.] From Black’s
Law Dictionary, sixth edition: “True – conformable to fact; correct;
exact; actual; honest. In one sense, that only is ‘true’ which is conformable
to the actual state of things.” [Puts the book aside.]

Witness: Well…It’s true about our not
knowing everything about terrorism.

Interrogator: Are you certain of that, sir? Would you swear to that? Honestly, sir, you should
be embarrassed to have such a position, while I find it disgraceful. [Grins,
and shakes his head.] Never mind. Go on.

Witness: It’s a complicated issue, a
frustrating task. There are so many variables, and motives, and causes, and
interpretations. It’s very difficult to fix a vector on motives or to triangulate
causes, often impossible to, although it’s our job to. But we can't pin
terrorism on one single cause. It’s unfairand highly presumptuous to blame Islam or ISIS or other jihadist organizations
for terrorism. It is policy that any analysis submitted by a subordinate that
relies exclusively on Islamic motives and perverse interpretations of Islam is
symptomatic of Islamophobia. The subordinate is then either disciplined or removed
from the program and transferred elsewhere.

Interrogator: I think, sir, that had we
relied on your assessment of Japanese
strengths and intentions after Pearl Harbor, we would still be fighting
that war, or lost it.

Witness: I am sorry, sir, that you have
such a low opinion of our work.

Interrogator: As am I. Sir, I have here
a Qur’an, which I have read almost in
its entirety and in which I have attached Post-its to pages that contain what
are called “violent verses.” That is, the ones that call for killing or enslaving
non-Muslims, encouraging brutal and bestial behavior towards non-Muslims, and
in general waging war on them. And, by extension, on us. [Interrogator holds
aloft a Qur’an, then puts it down.] I
asked my staff to cull those verses from the Qur’an and print them out for easier reference. There are about one
hundred and sixty-four or sixty-five such verses, out of a total of over
six thousand verses. These violent verses, which are quite
explicit in their wording and intent, and, I have read, are frequently
linked to verses, anecdotes, orSunnah
in the Hadith. [Interrogator picks up a sheaf of paper and wafts it in the air.]
This is the printout of the violent verses.I have had a copy of the printout made for you. [Indicates to a committee
clerk to give the Witness the
printout.] The Hadith will
not be a subject of discussion here, although I voice my own assumption that
you and members your unit, sir, are more familiar with the it than I wish to
be. And, it should go without saying, with the Qur'an.

Witness: [Giving a cursory glance at
the pages handed to him by a clerk.] Thank you, sir, for the pages here. Many
of the verses listed here I recognize instantly. But they have all been
mis-interpreted all out of proportion to their original intent. They have
nothing to do with Islam.

Interrogator: [Scoffing with incredulity.]
The terrorists beg your pardon, sir, but in virtually every instance of
terrorism in this country, regardless of the organization, the perpetrators
have either quoted one or more of these verses, or it was learned that they had
been cued or prompted by certain of these verses. They have everything to do
with Islam. That is a fact. Moreover, the violent verses, I have read from
authorities and scholars on the subject of the Qur'an, abrogated or replaced earlier ones that were more in line
with the Judeo-Christian ethic of kindness, tolerance, and forgiveness.

Witness: Misinterpretations of these
verses separate the terrorists from the authentic Islam, sir. We do not
formulate our analyses and hypotheses on what is in the Qur'an. That is distinctly against overall policy. We construct our
analyses based on how we think many
of the verses have been misconstrued by terrorists.

Interrogator: You don’t take the
violent verses literally, as they were written?

Witness: No, sir. That would be against
policy. It would be in error. We look for individualized interpretations unique
to a person to formulate a threat analysis based on what we think is or was meant.

Interrogator: What
you’re saying, then, is that a verse that goes [Interrogator picks up his own copy of the violent verses and reads
from it] “The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His apostle and strive to make mischief in the land is
only this, that they should be murdered or crucified or their hands and their
feet should be cut off on opposite sides or they should be imprisoned.” That’s
verse five colon thirty-three, and it means something entirely different? Or, “They wish that you should disbelieve as
they disbelieve, and then you would be equal; therefore take not to yourselves
friends of them, until they emigrate in the way of Allah; then, if they turn
their backs, take them, and slay them wherever you find them; take not to
yourselves any one of them as friend or helper.” That’s from verse four colon
eighty-nine. Or, “Fight in the way of with those who fight with you. And kill
them wherever you find them, and drive them out from whence they drove you out,
and persecution is severer than slaughter, and do not fight with them at the
Sacred Mosque until they fight with you in it, but if they do fight you, then
slay them; such is the recompense of the unbelievers,” verses two colon
one-hundred-ninety and ninety-one.” That doesn’t mean what it says, and you’re
suggesting that it might be a hidden metaphor for a Betty Crocker recipe?[Almost
all the spectators in the room chuckle discreetly, some not so discreetly.]

Witness: I can understand your
confusion, sir, but I see no point in introducing levity into this discussion.

Interrogator: Forgive me, sir, but the
absurdity of what you are insinuating in your answers invites some levity. Do
not the words in those and in other violent verses mean what they say? Were the
compilers of those verses master cryptologists? If not, and if something else is
meant that is radically different from what we can read, why did not the
compilers just come out say what the best way was to fix a falafel? [Again,
subdued laughter is heard in the chambers.]

Witness: I don’t know, sir. We have put
together some very unfunny scenarios
based on our projected moves the enemy might make.

Interrogator: I’m sure you have. But,
taken altogether, sir, when you read these verses, and see that they conform to
the actions taken by the terrorists, and to what their stated and iterated
overall goal is, which is to impose Sharia or Islamic law on non-Muslims or
unbelievers, to establish a Caliphate in this and in other countries – is that
what is called in your circles a doctrine,
or a philosophy of war? The verses cannot be taken to mean anything other than
what they literally say, at face value, at face meaning. The doctrine is there in plain sight. What
stops you from formulating a reciprocal doctrine, one that has the virtue of
working, and which is based on reality, and not on what one expert on this subject
– I believe his name is Stephen Coughlin – has called a pseudoreality? That is, with a projected threat analysis that does names
the enemy and is based on facts, on reality? It seems to me that the simplest
policy of your department would be to take the terrorists at their word, and
formulate an answering doctrine. Wouldn’t you agree?

Witness: It isn’t as simple as that,
sir. There are other considerations to take into account when refining a threat
analysis to send up the pike.

Interrogator: What
other considerations?

Witness: [After some throat-clearing
and a glass of water, the captain replied.] Well….one is that our conclusions
and assessments must agree in a general sense with those of our superiors,
first with majors and colonels up the line, and then with generals and
higher-up civilian overseers in the State Department, and the Joint Chiefs, and
so forth. If our products don’t mesh with their assessments, they throw it all
back in our faces

Interrogator: [A moment passes.] Tell
me, sir: Are you happy with that situation? With your work? By that I mean that
in large part your analyses only occasionally employ facts, and that they are
what can only and loosely be called fabrications and excursions into pseudoreality, on which our national
security and so many lives depend? Are you satisfied that you are adhering to
your oath to defend this country?

The
Witness remains silent, but is
obviously uncomfortable. He looks away from the dais.

The
Interrogator repeats his questions.

The
Witness remains silent. Looks around
the chamber with a stubborn expression.

Interrogator: You
may plead the Fifth if you are reluctant to answer, sir. [Laughter in the
chamber. He adds another remark.] You may avert your eyes and your mind from
the questions, sir. I believe a great philosopher called such behavior
“blanking out.” I think we are finished with you here.

The
Interrogator turns to other
committee members, and asks if any of them have questions for the Witness. The others shake their heads.

Interrogator: The committee is finished
with this Witness. He is dismissed. The hearing will take a
fifteen-minute recess, and reconvene to hear our second Witness.

The
captain leaves hastily amidst a general hubbub, brusquely refusing to answer
reporters’ questions and queries from some of his colleagues, and hurriedly exits
the chamber.

When
the hearing reconvenes, a new Witness,
a first lieutenant in the same Army counter-intelligence unit, is seated at the
table. After he is sworn in and identifies himself, and advised of the
seriousness of his testimony, including the consequences of perjury, he
recounts his career service, and at the end makes an opening statement.

Witness: If it pleases the committee, I
have brought with me a document that will confirm the testimony of the previous
Witness. I wish my testimony be focused on this document. [Witness rests hand atop a pile of purple-colored books.]

Interrogator: We shall see about that.
And what document is it, sir?

Witness: It is the Joint
Operation Planning manual, Joint Publication five-point-naught, issued
by the Joint Chiefs in August 2011.

Interrogator:Has it been updated since then?

Witness: No, sir, not since October 2010. I have brought
copies of it for the committee to peruse. [The Witness asks a clerk to hand the Interrogator and other committee members the copies. This is done. The Interrogator leafs through the manual.
He exclaims.] What a morass of mealy-mouthed bureaucratese! [Continues leafing
through the manual. Stops.] Ah! Here’s an interesting term, “Center of Gravity,”
or COG. Sir, would you mind reading that aloud for the record? It’s under “Executive
Summary, Elements of Operational Design,” Roman numeral page x-x-i.

Witness: [Turns to the page, reads.] “A
COG is a source of power that provides moral or physical strength, freedom of
action, or will to act. An objective is always linked to a COG. In identifying
COGs it is important to remember that irregular warfare focuses on legitimacy
and influence over a population, unlike traditional warfare, which employs
direct military confrontation to defeat an adversary’s armed forces, destroy an
adversary’s war-making capacity, or seize or retain territory to force a change
in an adversary’s government or
policies.”

Interrogator: Thank you. COG. The “Center
of Gravity.” Sir, would you say that was descriptive euphemism for a doctrine? It covers all the essentials
of understanding one’s enemy’s means and ends.

Witness: In the short-term, yes, I would
call that a doctrine. The term “moral strength” I think is a discreet term for a
doctrine unique to Islam, or a prudent reference to it.

Interrogator: I agree. Say, rather, it
is a singularly circumspect term for Sharia. [He leafs through the manual.]
Also, I notice that the preferred term throughout is “adversary.” Is “enemy”
too strong a word for whom they’re discussing? These are generals, war-fighters.
[To himself.] Maybe they’re better golfers than they are generals.

Witness: I noticed that, too. I can't answer
your question, sir.

Interrogator: Now, on to what you
wished us to focus on.

Witness: Please direct your attention to
Roman number Part Four, pages seven and eight, on the section on “assumptions.”
The wording in the 2011 edition is similar to that of the 2010 and 2006
editions of the manual. It is under the heading, “Determine Known Facts and
Develop Planning Assumptions.” The differences in wording are slight. I think
this is important to bring to your attention. The term “assumption” occurs
numerous times throughout the manual. But in the discussion of assumptions on
the cited pages, there is a serious qualification which I think merits your attention,
as well, because it affects every statement in the manual that employs the term.

Interrogator: [He has found the page
and reads it.] I see what you mean, sir. Please read it aloud for the record.

Witness: “An assumption provides a supposition about
the current situation or future course of events, assumed to be true in the absence of facts. Assumptions that
address gaps in knowledge are critical for the planning process to continue.
For planning purposes, subordinate commanders can treat assumptions made by
higher headquarters as true in the absence of proof to the contrary. However,
they should challenge those assumptions if they appear unrealistic. Assumptions
must be continually reviewed to ensure validity. A valid assumption has three
characteristics: logical, realistic, and essential for the planning to continue.
Assumptions are made for both friendly and adversary situations.”

Interrogator: I see what you mean, sir.
“Assumed to be true in the absence of
facts”? That is an astounding confession of moral and cognitive
decrepitude. Just because a general says so, you’re to go ahead and implement
his plan which is based on an absence of facts?? Just on his say-so? On his gussied up, three-star conjecture? It’s
curious that the statement is highlighted in bold. [Pauses.] How often do you
subordinates challenge the assumptions of the higher-ups?

Witness: [Replies meekly.] Not very
often, sir. But, I would also like to direct your attention to the Glossary,
page GL dash five. It’s a qualification – or an emendation – to the entry on “assumption.”

Interrogator: [With other committee
members, turns to the Glossary. The Interrogator
scans the entry.] Please read it for the record.

Witness: [Reading from the manual.] “Assumption.
A supposition on the current situation or a presupposition on the future course
of events, either or both assumed to be true in the absence of positive proof, necessary to enable the commander in the
process of planning to complete an estimate of the situation and make a decision
on the course of action.”

Interrogator: An “absence of
positive proof”?? [Shrugging, and gesturing with his hands.] But, it means
the same thing as an “absence of facts”! It just isn’t as starkly brazen a way
of saying the same thing. It’s what Mr. Sheridan would call “puffery.” But I’m not
sure right now which category the phrase would fit into. I may have to
invent a new one.

Witness: Sir?

Interrogator:[Waving a hand.] Never mind. I was
thinking of that play, The Critic.
Tell me, sir: How often do you review assumptions to check their validity?

Interrogator: You have my sympathies. [Studies the Witness for a moment. He snaps the
manual shut.] If it pleases the committee, I would like to adjourn this hearing
until tomorrow. I need to take this document home to read and examine more
closely. I would advise the committee to do the same. We should reconvene at
ten a.m. [Addressing the Witness.]
Sir, please make yourself available to continue your testimony. Thank you for
your illuminating insights. I’m sure you have many more to convey.

Witness: Yes, sir. I do.

Interrogator: This hearing is adjourned until ten a.m. tomorrow.

General hubbub of people rising,
talking, and leaving.
________________________________________________________________________

Many thanks to Stephen Coughlin for the chance to pen this brief drama.

Saturday, December 26, 2015

I commented on a Daniel Greenfield FrontPage column
of December 24th, “Muslim
Immigration is Exactly What ISIS Wants.” In it, Greenfield argues that ISIS
wants to send thousands of its “fighters” to Europe and especially to the U.S.,
for the purpose of establishing operational bases for terrorism.

Agreeing
with everything said by Mr. Greenfield concerning ISIS's tactics and overall
strategy, a crucial question is: Because Obama wants to bring in tens of
thousands of Muslim "refugees," and knows damned well there will be
scores of ISIS agents among them, is this what he wants? Is he acting as an
agent for ISIS? …I can posit an answer, but this is a question which would
naturally occur to anyone observing Obama's actions and statements.

And that has been over the years, at least seven of
them. In June 2008 I penned a five-part commentary on the rise of Barack Obama,
“The Year of the Long Knives,” which is accessible here.
(That series does not mention Islam or Muslims even once.It dwells chiefly on the mooning crush on Obama
our decrepit “aristocracy of money” has exhibited.) In this column I am
positing an answer. It is purely speculative.

If it smacks of a “conspiracy theory,” so be it.
Because, after all, what exactly is a “conspiracy”? It is a plan, a long-range one,
featuring many shadowy co-conspirators and their dupes and dogberries, together
with secret funding and a knack for devious dissimulation. The term “conspiracy
theory” has garnered the dubious distinction of being the exclusive preserve of
garden variety kooks and of men who wear aluminum foil hats to better
communicate with the aliens who are working with the Rosicrucians allied with
the Elders of Zion to take over the earth.

And if there are observable, plausible, demonstrable
dots to connect which, when connected, begin to show the outline and elements
of a “conspiracy,” then one has a “theory.” Then the task is to pursue the
devil in the details. Sometimes a conspiracy theory is structurally sound but
empty of evidentiary details; other times there is, as Stephen Coughlin put it
in Catastrophic
Failure,

“…a
tremendous amount of raw data. We denature it, break it into data bits, and
pour it into a soft-science mold….The data on which our understanding is should
have been based now serves only to buttress whichever theory is in vogue.” (p.
453).

In short, the conspiracy theory may be rich in
details but have no credible, realistic structure. It may be a thousand-piece
jigsaw puzzle of blanks on which one can spray-paint any image but that of
Islam.

However, there is
a conspiracy afoot – one that has been walking the walk for many years –
perhaps not even beginning with the Muslim Brotherhood’s description in the 1991
Explanatory
Memorandum of how to corrupt and take over America and the West, but even
before that, say, in 1928 with the formation of the Muslim Brotherhood by Hassan
al-Banna. Or in 1964 with the publication of Milestones
by Sayyid Qutb, a
Brotherhood member, whose advocacy of an incremental introduction of Sharia law
is followed “religiously” by his successors.

In Obama’s case, I do not think it is so much a
conspiracy with ISIS and Al-Qaeda, with the Muslim Brotherhood, with CAIR, with
the ISNA, and with the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), as it is a
simpatico, symmetrical, ideological marriage made in hell. Islam is
totalitarian; and hates America. Obama’s leftist ideology is totalitarian, and
hates America. The alliance of the Left and Islam is a matter of record. Of
course they would exploit each other’s grand plan to bring down America.But I doubt very much there is buried email
correspondence or communications between the White House and, say, Abu Bakr
al-Baghdadi, the leader of the Islamic State, or anything like Hillary
Clinton’s surreptitious emails over Benghazi and her hidden bathroom email
server.

So, I don’t think Obama is our “Islamic Candidate,”
in the way of the half-witted character in 1962’s The Manchurian Candidate.
He was the garrulous, buffoonish
husband, John Yerkes Iselin, played by James Gregory, of the power-lusting mistress
of manipulation, played by Angela Lansbury (any resemblance in character
between Mrs. Eleanor Shaw Iselin and Hillary Clinton is startlingly
appropriate). She plotted to have his presidential running mate assassinated by
her own son so her husband could take his place as the presidential candidate
and very likely win the White House, where she would be the power in the Oval
Office.

Obama, however, is not a half-wit; he knows what
he’s doing. He has stayed the course of his collectivist agenda ever since
entering politics. He’s shrewd, deceitful, glibly articulate, and a master of
insouciance. That is my kinder description of him. But, is he Putin’s poodle?
Bill Clinton’s gofer? Hillary Clinton’s whipping boy? George Soros’s puppet? Or
Islam’s useful idiot? Or is he just a “lone wolf” executive
jihadi? I can’t think of a single policy action of his, including the
immigration issue, that hasn’t if not immediately benefited the advance of
Islam, later came home to roost.

So, is what ISIS wants, what Obama wants? Those
reams of unintegrated data possibly presented to him in his morning security
briefings – which Obama may or may not take seriously or even bother to read –
must inform him of ISIS plans to infiltrate into the country with hordes of
Syrian “refugees,” and across the border from Mexico. If we, the public he
wishes to deceive, are aware of these facts, can he not be, regardless of the
accuracy and truth, or lack of such, in the information presented at his
briefings? How can Obama not know
what is going on?

I would say, yes, he knows. He has met with
prominent Muslim figures overseas – who knows what was said between him and
them behind closed doors? – when he met with Saudi
kings and when he met with officials at Cairo
University in 2009 and delivered his pro-Islam
speech. His foreign policy agencies are top-heavy with “moderate” Muslims,
all vetted with so-called security clearances. There are probably more Muslims in
Obama’s administration than there were Communists and fellow travelers in
Roosevelt’s. This cannot be as simple an issue of politically correct hiring policies
– “we mustn’t be beastly or discriminatory towards harmless American Muslims!” –
but rather a signature characteristic of Obama’s administration.

Greenfield’s argument about how Muslim immigration
benefits ISIS (and all the other implicated Islamic entities) is that the more
Muslims are settled in Western countries, and especially in the U.S., the more
potent their presence as colonizers and permanent “settlers” and as
fifth-column type terrorists, ready to go into action once their jihadi psyche
is triggered on orders from afar, or eclectically as individuals. Anything that
enlarges the Ummah, or the global
Islamic collective, benefits the Islamic Movement, even if it’s only a small
pocket of Somalis in Cheyenne, Wyoming. However, writes Greenfield:

The
ritualistic “Why do they hate us” browbeating favored by the chattering classes
is nonsense. Al Qaeda hated us because we were not Muslims. But it was only
using us as the hated “other” to consolidate a collective Muslim identity. We
are to Islamists what the Jews were to Hitler; a useful scapegoat whose
otherness can be used to manufacture a contrasting pure Aryan or Islamic
identity….

No
dialogue is possible with an ideology whose virtue is premised on seeing you as
utterly evil….

ISIS doesn’t plan to defeat
America through acts of terrorism. The plan for defeating America, like every
other country, Muslim or non-Muslim, is to build a domestic Muslim terror
movement that will be able to hold territory and swear allegiance to the
Islamic State….

ISIS does not plan to defeat
America with terror plots. But those plots will eventually accumulate into an
organized domestic terror organization. An Islamic State in America based
around a majority Muslim town or neighborhood with its own leader pledging
allegiance to the Caliph of the Islamic State.

Dearborn, Michigan comes to mind. Greenfield:

Any
Muslim plans for expanding into the West depend on Muslim immigration. Whether
it’s ISIS or its Muslim Brotherhood ancestor, or any of the other Islamist
organizations and networks, they all require manpower. Some of that manpower
will be provided by high Muslim birth rates, but it won’t be nearly enough, not
for a country the size of America, without a large annual flow of Muslim
migrants.

We
are told that halting Muslim immigration would only encourage Muslim terrorism.
But our open door to Muslim immigration certainly hasn’t stopped terrorism.
Instead it has increased it by providing reinforcements to the terrorists. If
we can’t stop Muslim terrorism with the population we have now, how are we
going to manage it if the Islamic population continues doubling and even
tripling?

ISIS doesn’t need to be “offended” by a call to
halt Muslim immigration to the U.S. to launch terrorist attacks. It already has
a plan, a doctrine, and an open conspiracy, as explained in that notorious Explanatory Memorandum from 1991:

“The
process of settlement is a ‘Civilization-Jihadist Process’ with all the word
means. The Ikhwan [Muslim Brotherhood] must understand that their work in
America is a kind of grand jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization
from within and ‘sabotaging’ its miserable house by their hands and the hands
of the believers so that it is eliminated and God’s religion is made victorious
over all other religions.”

If Obama was ever Muslim Brotherhood friendly – and
he certainly hailed the triumph of Mohamed Morsi and the
Brotherhood in Egypt, and even, with
Hillary Clinton, contributed to Morsi’s rise, albeit it lasted only
a year – he had to have had knowledge of the Explanatory Memorandum. He has to know that the Brotherhood’s
overall doctrine, which is identical to ISIS’s, and CAIR’s, and the OIC’s, is
to impose Sharia on the West and most particularly on the U.S.

Further on ISIS’s preference for an enabled
immigration of Muslims, Greenfield notes:

Even
if we defeat ISIS tomorrow, Al Qaeda and other Islamist groups descended from
the Muslim Brotherhood will continue pursuing the same goals. And they will
rely on the Muslim population in the United States to provide them with money,
supplies, cover and an infrastructure for terrorism.

ISIS
can’t defeat us with terror attacks. The only hope for an enduring Islamic
victory over America is through the rise of domestic groups that pledge
allegiance to the Caliphate. ISIS can’t invade America. It has to be invited
in. That’s what our immigration policy does. Trump isn’t a threat to national
security. Muslim immigration is….

Muslim
immigration is the Islamic State’s only hope for victory over America.

In terms of imposing Sharia law on the U.S., it is
also the hope of the Muslim Brotherhood, the OIC, and CAIR, among all the other
Islamic front groups now in the country.

Earlier, I mentioned George Soros. No conspiracy
theories need be fashioned where he is concerned. He has openly supported
Obama’s program to “transform” the country and has meddled in no little way to
steer U.S. foreign policy to his liking, which has been the diminution of American
influence and the reduction of the country into a Balkanized collection of
warring pressure, religious, and ethnic groups. His “rap sheet” on Discover
the Networks is several pages long. Obama was certainly Soros’s preferred
candidate. This is described in New York Magazine’s October 2007 article, “Money
Chooses Sides.”

The
investment banker Robert Wolf first met Barack Obama one afternoon in December
in a midtown conference room. Obama was in town to deliver a speech at a
charity dinner for children in poverty at the Mandarin Oriental—but also to
pursue another, less high-minded, but more momentous, objective: to begin the
process of attempting to pick Hillary Clinton’s pocket.

The
conference room belonged to George Soros, the billionaire bête noire of the
right. After talking to Soros for an hour about his prospective bid for the
White House, Obama walked down the hall and found assembled a dozen of the
city’s heaviest-hitting Democratic fund-raisers: investment banker Hassan
Nemazee, Wall Street power Blair Effron, private-equity hotshot Mark Gallogly,
hedge-fund manager Orin Kramer. Most had been big-time John Kerry backers in
2004. Most had a connection to the Clintons. All were officially uncommitted
for 2008.

I have no idea why the author of the article, John Heilemann, would characterize Soros
as “the billionaire bête noire of the right,” when Soros is of the global government
left. But then journalists from the left
usually see any billionaire as a right-wing, knuckle-dragging fascist. And Heilemann
has a master’s degree from the John
F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, which can explain his
confusion. Further, it is billionaires like Soros, Bill Gates, Warren Buffet,
Mark Zuckerberg, and others who have become the voluble vanguard of global
socialism.

Is Soros a conspirator? I think so. In his role as
a spread-the-wealth, Yes-you-built-that-but-we're-going-to-take-it-anyway
gadfly, he has spoken against national borders. This was revealed in a November
Breitbart article, “Soros
Admits Involvement in Migrant Crisis.” In response to Hungarian Prime
Minister Viktor Orban’s accusation that Soros was one of the movers behind the
hordes of migrants crossing European borders, Soros sent an email:

Mr.
Soros has now issued an email statement to Bloomberg Business, claiming
his foundations help “uphold European values”, while Mr. Oban’s actions in
strengthening the Hungarian border and stopping a huge migrant influx
“undermine those values.”

“His
plan treats the protection of national borders as the objective and the
refugees as an obstacle,” Mr. Soros added. “Our plan treats the protection of
refugees as the objective and national borders as the obstacle.”

Yes, national borders are obstacles. Aside from
helping define the character of a nation, they also serve the same purpose as
fences, doors, windows, and locks, which help to frustrate trespassers,
burglars, home invaders, and other predators. It is a nation’s
identity that Soros wants to erase.

In 2006, FrontPage
interviewed Richard Poe, the co-author of The
Shadow Party: How George Soros, Hillary Clinton, and Sixties Radicals
Seized Control of the Democratic Party. Among other things, Poe said:

The
Shadow Party is always changing. New groups form and old ones dissolve.
For instance, America Coming Together -- which raised $135 million for Democrat
get-out-the-vote drives in 2004 – has been mothballed, at least for now.
The most active Shadow Party groups today are probably the Center for American
Progress, America Votes, Democracy Alliance, the New Democrat Network, the New
Politics Institute, ACORN and, of course, MoveOn.org.

In
his new book The Age of Fallibility,
Soros writes, “The main obstacle to a
stable and just world order is the United States.”He announced in 2003 that it is
necessary to “puncture the bubble of American supremacy.” Soros is
working systematically to achieve that goal. (Italics mine)

So is Obama. Is this why Soros backed Obama’s run
for the presidency? He certainly placed the right bet. But did Soros also see Obama
as an ideal Islamic Candidate as long ago as 2007? Doubtless. Soros’s role in
the mass invasion of Europe didn’t show until there was resistance to his “open
society/open borders” notion began to manifest itself, especially in
Eastern Europe.

His
tentacles are everywhere. Muslim migrants arriving in Europe are given a
‘migrants handbook’ packed with tips, maps, phone numbers and advice about
getting across Europe. The “rough guide” contains phone numbers of organizations
which might help refugees. The ‘rough guide’ is written in Arabic and contains
phone numbers of organizations which will help refugees making the journey,
such as the Red Cross and UNHCR. The “Rough Guide”, being printed and
distributed by the Soros “Open Society” group “W2eu” or “Welcome to the
EU”, Foundations, has activists handing out these guides for free in Turkey.

And
how can one account for all the cell phones, tennis shoes, clothing, backpacks,
and other personal items carried by the thousands of healthy male “refugees”
posing as impoverished Syrians fleeing the chaos of the Syrian civil war, or from
Libya, Somalia, and the Balkans? Too likely these were also distributed free by
Soros through Open Society or some other NGO he controls.

In
conclusion, I would mark Barack Obama as every Islamic collectivist’s perfect
candidate to help advance Islam in the West and around the world. That may or may
not be Soros’s religious cup of tea, but I don’t think it would make any difference
to him who or what dissolves the West in the name of whatever fantasy world he
imagines the world ought to be. That is the nature of the poisonous, maleficent
ball of glop that is Soros’s “soul,” which only a Fyodor Dostoyevskywould have the fortitude to examine in
depth.

And,
because so much of Obama’s past is either closed to
scrutiny (e.g., his not releasing much information about his academic
career) or off limits to any kind of “shovel-ready” investigating reporting.

Only
Obama knows for sure whether or not he is “The Islamic Candidate.” And his
actions, speeches, and policies over the last seven years are certainly not
calculated to discourage the idea.

Edward Cline, American Novelist

Edward Cline was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1946. After graduating from high school (in which he learned nothing of value) and a stint in the Air Force, he pursued his ambition to become a novelist. His first detective novel, First Prize, was published in 1988 by Mysterious Press/Warner Books, and his first suspense novel, Whisper the Guns, was published in 1992 by The Atlantean Press. First Prize was republished in 2009 by Perfect Crime. The Sparrowhawk series of novels set in England and Virginia in the pre-Revolutionary period has garnered critical acclaim (but not yet from the literary establishment) and universal appreciation from the reading public, including parents, teachers, students, scholars, and adult readers who believe that American history has been abandoned or is misrepresented by a government-dominated educational establishment. He is dedicated to Objectivism, Ayn Rand's philosophy of reason in all matters.